


The Wolf and The Shepherd

by Neyiea



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Enemy Lovers, M/M, Metaphors, Post-Season/Series 04, Pre-Season/Series 05, References to Canon Child Abuse, Star-crossed adversaries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-05-11
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:21:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24095767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neyiea/pseuds/Neyiea
Summary: A half cannot destroy that which makes it whole without losing pieces of itself in the process. That’s why they are destined to be at each other’s throats forever; taunting and threatening but never putting a true end to it. They are caught in the midst of a repeating cycle, revolving around each other with no end in sight.But neither one of them appreciates being predictable. It is good to change up the dance every once in a while.
Relationships: Jerome Valeska/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 11
Kudos: 86





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A follow up to [Mania](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23642959)  
> because that wolf/shepherd metaphor really sent me and I wanted to expand a little.

Most of Gotham has fallen into a laughable madness, one that always makes Jerome’s smile stretch even wider as he thinks of it. He had wanted to paint the town crazy and he’d succeeded. The streets were a canvas for unrelenting destruction—be it from Jerome and his lackies, or those who had once formed the legion of horribles, or the criminals who had eagerly sprung forth from the shadows once Gotham’s isolation was cemented—and looking upon it every night made something burning and dangerous flutter wildly in his chest. He feels pride, because none of this could have happened if not for his vision and ambition. The particulars were messy, and the civilians who didn’t know that Jeremiah’s untimely metamorphosis had been due to a chemical kick-start blamed his brother for the aftermath entirely, but the lack of complete credit surprisingly didn’t do much to bring down his mood. To have people shaking in pathetic fear over Jeremiah made it much easier for Jerome to go about his business at times, and it wasn’t as if nobody knew enough to acknowledge that he had a hand in the matter. The facts were apparent to all of the people whose opinions actually held importance. 

The fact that Bruce was looking for Jeremiah, even though he was well acquainted with all of the most significant secrets, did put a bit of a damper on his fun.

But then, perhaps Bruce was looking for some kind of vengeance, and Jerome considers that somewhat unlikely option with a growing sense of excitement. He had said that Jeremiah had hurt him worse than Jerome ever had, after all, even without threatening his life. If it was blood that he wanted—if it was blood that he was willing to take as payment for past sins—then Jerome would be more than happy to offer his services in locating his hiding brother as long as he was allowed to watch the fallout.

That he would be able to rub Jeremiah’s face in his and Bruce’s mercurial-but-undeniable connection was also a point in that plan’s favour. 

Heat lights up underneath his skin as he circles around the barricade from a distance. Inside the haphazard walls the Green Zone is almost completely untouched by the mayhem of the Dark Zone, for now. Inside there are boring civilians who would be all too easy to tear apart. Inside there are cowering sheep hiding under their beds, praying that the walls will never fail them. 

Inside there is Bruce.

What must he be like in there, Jerome wonders as he slips behind a building, the barricade concealed from his sight as he follows the street. The shepherd who was eager to tend to his bleating, ungrateful flock? The self-appointed guardian of those who were meant to become prey in times such as these. The feller of wolves and other bloodthirsty creatures. Jerome thinks of his special night when all the lights in Gotham went out, thinks of Bruce’s unflinching determination to stand against him even at the risk of a public execution carried out by Jerome’s hands, thinks of the brutality which had eventually overcome him when they fought in the maze of mirrors. He had been interesting back then. He had grown even more interesting with time.

He makes a good protector, loath as Jerome is to admit it. Focused. Valiant. Unrelenting. 

He would make a good predator, if his morals weren’t so unshakable.

Well. Perhaps not wholly unshakable. 

Sometimes Jerome is sure that he can sense the ghost of Bruce’s lips against his, that he can feel a body underneath him going slack as Bruce did the unthinkable and actually gave in to his baser urges for once in his life. Jerome has done many mad and terrible things, but none had left him feeling quite as illustrious as the sensation of Bruce kissing him back.

He steps past the building. The barricade comes back into sight. 

He wonders if there are sheep at the gate, anxiously watching a wolf pace around them, unsure if the walls were high enough or strong enough to protect them.

They aren’t, not if he truly makes up his mind to break in. He had wanted to save his stockpile of explosives for something else—he is not a man who forgets being crossed, and Penguin had a lot to answer for—but he wants other things, too. Things that had little to do with spreading madness like a plague and everything to do with how Bruce had left him, literally gasping for breath, after their last dance had come to an abrupt end.

Jerome is willing to admit, privately, that perhaps that had not been the best time to test Bruce’s temper. Though he would also admit, to Bruce himself if given another opportunity and to his brother just to watch Jeremiah be overcome by jealous rage, that Bruce’s eyes were uncannily stunning when his anger flared up. 

Jerome hadn’t been lying when he’d called Bruce beautiful. Not at all.

But it is not merely good looks that have him circumnavigating the walls meant to keep people like him out, wondering what he will have to do in order to see that familiar face again. Beauty was nothing without substance. A beautiful person who was boring would never be as alluring as someone whose bland or ugly appearance hid something remarkable underneath. 

And Bruce hid many remarkable things underneath his cool, steadfast exterior, some better concealed than others. Jerome is sure that there were many mysteries left to unravel regarding the history of the boy who had grown from a mere stepping-stone into one of the most fascinating people Jerome had ever come across—and that was including the legion of horribles. 

He might not have to use the explosives. Might not have to force his way in at all. Bruce is vigilant, almost to the point of being paranoid—although if anyone had the right to be paranoid it was the person who attracted so much danger that it was a miracle he had survived so long, and that wasn’t even taking into consideration the volatile people who were somehow drawn into his orbit—and he is always on the lookout for any indication that his beloved citizens need saving. 

Jerome has been circling the barricade for nearly half an hour.

A wolf taunting a shepherd with its presence. 

He allows himself a sharp smile at the metaphor, at the way it suits them.

And then he feels something sharper than his grin press against his back. 

“I realize that you have very little else to do but be a menace to society,” Bruce’s voice is low, edged with a threat that might just make Jerome’s heart race a little bit, “but is there a particular reason why you’ve decided to take a midnight stroll so close to a protected border?”

“Because you are the one who protects it, obviously.”

Gotham used to have no heroes; then Bruce took it upon himself to become one. It should have made him less interesting, just like his uptight cop friends, but there was just enough darkness in his bearing to link him to the city that he called home—the city which had a hand in making them both as they were today—to attract and keep Jerome’s attention. 

Bruce is silent for a moment. The knife he is holding against Jerome’s back—cleverly aimed at a place that would hurt like a bitch but was unlikely to prove fatal if punctured, and Jerome is absolutely sure that the position is deliberate and not mere chance—neither retreats nor presses harder against him.

“I’m not the only one who stands guard. You’re going to attract attention.”

“But you are the only one who matters, Brucie,” Jerome croons. “Besides, you know how much I love being the center of attention.”

Bruce hums under his breath in dry acknowledgement but doesn’t respond any further than that. He’s likely weighing his options. 

What Jerome had told him last time was true; capturing him and putting him in a cell in the Green Zone wouldn’t do Bruce any good. He must have known that, because he hadn’t attempted to drag Jerome into the gated community after their memorable scuffle and even-more-memorable make out session. You don’t pen a wolf inside the sheepfold and just expect that no bloodshed will result from it. Bruce is too smart, too calculating, to do anything rash. Most of the time, anyways.

Laughter bubbles up in Jerome’s chest, but he purses his lips to keep it in. 

He needs to tread a little more carefully now that Bruce is here. 

“I assume that this is your particular way of saying you want to speak with me,” Bruce eventually concedes. “Since you came alone I suppose I could let you have a minute of my time.” The pointed tip against Jerome’s back presses just hard enough to dig into his skin and Jerome shivers, but not out fear. The element of danger sends an electric current up his spine and it makes his blood run hot.

Fuck, Bruce could threaten him any day.

“One minute,” Bruce says before the knife drops away. “And then I’m running you off whether you’ve said what you came here to say or not. Don’t waste either of our time.” 

Jerome turns around, seeking out Bruce’s flat eyes and unsmiling mouth. There is something there, sparking in the depths of him, something that calls out to Jerome in a way that nothing else ever has. He licks his lips.

“When did you start carrying a knife around with you, oh fearless shepherd?”

Bruce looks as though he would roll his eyes if he could manage doing so without momentarily losing sight of Jerome. 

“You never know when you’ll need a letter-opener, or a rope cutter, or a tool to fend off thieves or kidnappers,” Bruce tells him, voice purposefully bland. “And it is best to be prepared for all kinds of situations in times like these. Not even the Green Zone is completely safe, and occasionally I feel as though I’m being watched. I suppose you wouldn’t have anything to do with that, would you, oh rabid wolf?” 

Jerome smirks at the designation, their own private joke, before focusing on the matter at hand.

“I don’t send out spies to stalk you, if that’s what you’re asking me. I prefer our confrontations to have a personal touch.”

Bruce’s lips pull into a frown. He’s likely thinking along the same lines as Jerome is right now.

Who would want to keep tabs on Bruce, while not revealing their presence to Bruce?

Only one name pops into Jerome’s mind.

“Thirty seconds,” Bruce tells him out of the blue, and Jerome doesn’t resist the urge to twist his face into an expression that is half-scowl, half-pout. 

“You can’t know that,” he challenges, “you don’t even have a watch.”

“Twenty-five,” Bruce states firmly. Stubborn, rule-abiding brat. Jerome wonders what the people who don’t realize how much dangerous potential lurks inside of Bruce think of him.

Probably what Jerome used to think of him, up on a stage a literal lifetime ago. 

Those assumptions had all turned out to be so very, breathtakingly false. 

There are many things Jerome would say if he had the time to say them, alas, he is not a helpless civilian for Bruce to go out of his way for. Their history was enough for Bruce to give him a minute, but their history was also full of reasons for Bruce to never want to speak to him again. 

Ah, but there lay the puzzle; because any rational person wouldn’t give Jerome a chance to speak at all if he’d done to them even half of what he’d done to Bruce. Bruce was, therefore, irrational. And Jerome is an expert on the irrational. 

A smirk blooms across Jerome’s mouth. Bruce narrows his eyes at him.

“Kiss me,” Jerome demands, silently delighting in the way Bruce’s eyes widen ever-so-slightly before his impartial mask falls back into place.

There is a beat of silence. 

“You must be joking.”

“Fight me, then.” One or the other, he could live with either.

He’d _love_ both.

Bruce opens his mouth, perhaps to tell Jerome that he’s being ridiculous, perhaps to curse his very existence. Jerome doesn’t care. He also doesn’t give Bruce the chance to say it. 

He darts forward and, just like that, they’ve begun to dance all over again.

Bruce tucks away the knife when the fists start flying—a shame, really, but not entirely unexpected—and Jerome laughs as he dodges a kick. Laughs harder when Bruce drops to the ground and sweeps his feet out from under him. He rolls before he can get pinned, although being pinned down by Bruce again would undoubtedly prove to be thrilling. It always was. 

Jerome is bigger and more brutal—he doesn’t pull his punches, not even with Bruce—but Bruce is faster and must have had some kind of formal training, which Jerome would love to someday grill him about. Their differences level out the playing field and it’s—

Exciting. Fighting Bruce is always so exciting. 

Kissing him had been exciting, too, and not in an entirely different way.

What could Jerome say? He was attracted to eccentricity and danger, and Bruce radiated both underneath his carefully constructed disguises of normality. 

“I can’t believe I bothered trailing after you for fifteen minutes,” Bruce grouses, a little breathless. Training or not, he hasn’t yet been involved in enough brawls to be an endurance fighter. “If I’d known that this was all you wanted I would have just stayed inside and let you tire yourself out with your mindless circling.” 

“This isn’t all I want,” Jerome protests, inwardly thrilled at the knowledge that Bruce had been shadowing him so skillfully. He was so much more dangerous than any of his sad little civilians could guess. “You just didn’t give me time to say everything that I wanted from you in dirty, explicit detail.” 

“You’re disgusting.”

“Oh, Bruce.” Jerome holds a hand over his heart, eyelashes fluttering theatrically. “You don’t know the half of it.”

His entire head snaps back as Bruce lands a hit to his jaw. He bites his tongue and blood floods his mouth.

He’s never wanted anyone more in his entire life. 

His arms come down around Bruce before he has a chance to pull away completely, and Jerome locks the teen against his chest as hard as he can. 

“What do you suppose happens when a wolf decides that it wants the shepherd more than the sheep,” he whispers in Bruce’s ear. He indulgently grazes his teeth along the cartilage and smirks when he can feel Bruce’s breath hitch at the action. “Does the shepherd offer himself as a sacrifice, or does he finally slaughter the beast?”

Bruce stomps onto Jerome’s toes, hard enough that Jerome cannot stop a hiss from escaping his clenched teeth. He’s undoubtedly livid at the mention of murder. Jerome had known that he would be. 

“Rude. Did you fight Jeremiah like this?”

That’s a low blow and Jerome knows it, he can feel it in the air even before his lips form his twin’s name. He eagerly expects something vicious—maybe even underhanded—in response. 

He doesn’t expect Bruce backhanding him across the face. The slap echoes throughout the empty street, and for the first time in a long time Jerome feels genuinely stunned. Not for long though, because Bruce’s wide-eyed expression quickly brings him back to himself. Bruce knew just enough of Jerome’s sordid family history to suspect that a hit like that might bring forth a few terrible, tragic memories. Jerome could lean into that, could goad him into further guilt with a few key phrases about alcoholic mothers and sadistic uncles, but that would destroy the mood even for him.

And he’d only ever been hit with closed fists, anyway. 

So instead of bothering to waste his breath on meaningless words he grabs Bruce by the shoulders and drags him in before he can recover his senses. 

Their teeth clack together as their lips meet—Jerome is in a bit too much of a rush to attempt anything like tenderness—and Bruce is frozen for a moment, eyes wide open as he processes what’s happened.

And then he melts.

If only all do-gooders were so easy to subdue. Not that Jerome particularly wanted to go kissing every cop in the GCPD. Or any of them, really, unless it was to purposefully humiliate them.

 _This_ isn’t about humiliation.

Bruce drags a hand up the back of Jerome’s neck, fingertips sliding through his shorter hair before roughly winding into the longer strands. He tilts his head, mouth falling open to allow a deeper kiss, and Jerome would be a fool not to take advantage.

 _This_ is about finishing what they started a week ago.

Jerome presses, presses, presses, until Bruce’s back is up against a rough brick wall. No one will be able to see them from beyond the barricade. Alone in the dark once again. He doesn’t bother holding back the rough laugh that builds up in his throat. It rumbles between them, muffled by Bruce’s mouth. Bruce’s hand digs a little tighter in his hair in response to it, and Jerome doesn’t bother holding back the sound that he instinctively makes because of that, either. 

_This_ is about _them._ Hero and villain. Shepherd and wolf. Revolving around each other in an endless cycle. Scheme, fight, victory. Scheme, fight, defeat. Licking their wounds and preparing themselves for the next confrontation. There’s a balance to it, as if they complete each other, as if they are meant to stay in each other’s orbit like this forever no matter how the world might fall apart or build up around them. The utter predictability of it should make Jerome’s skin itch—he loathed even the tedious notion of acting in a way that was expected, where was the fun in that?—but he supposes he can bear it, since it’s Bruce that he is connected to in such a way. Bruce is the best foe that a madman like himself could ask for, and they both still have so much room to grow. They will become more cunning, more powerful, more menacing. They’ll spur each other on. 

Still, it is fun to break the cycle every so often.

And what better way than with a kiss? 

He’d like to pretend that it is only Bruce who is giving in, but truthfully Jerome yields just as much as the teen as time stretches before them. There is something that is bubbling up inside the both of them—the connection which allows them to trade words as they trade blows, the attachment which marks them as each other’s greatest enemy—and they are both susceptible to the pull. Deep in his heart Jerome knows that Bruce is the only one capable of killing him, and that he is the only one capable of killing Bruce. The jagged edges of them match; they are two halves of something destined to shake the foundations of the earth. No matter how they might fight and scheme and destroy neither one of them would ever take the final step needed to be the cause of the other’s irrevocable downfall. They’d lose pieces of themselves in the process. 

How gruesomely romantic it is.


	2. Chapter 2

It had been nothing but chance that Bruce had spotted him at all.

He’d been perched on a rooftop, legs dangling over the edge, staring out at the sinister darkness that made up the unlit portion of the city. His social call with Selina in the evening had ended without a high note, but his visits to her hospital room often left him feeling so abysmal that having nothing to smile over was a good visit as long as there weren’t tears stinging his eyes by the end of it. He’d needed some space afterwards but had known that it would be pushing his luck to slip directly into the Dark Zone again, considering how Alfred would react if Bruce was late checking in so soon after last time.

Last time…

His face felt hot and he’d resolutely stared into the gloom, daring it to give him a reason to leave his perch on the edge which separated the light from the dark. He’d been itching to go back and follow the graffiti to Jerome’s last known whereabouts, and not only to look for clues about the explosives that he’d been stockpiling.

He’d no doubt moved them after Bruce had swiftly left him behind in a fit of pique, but Jerome’s boastful personality meant that he also might have left a clue for Bruce on the chance that he’d come searching. His self-centered pursuit of amusement might mean that he’d lay some sort of elaborate trap in the hopes that Bruce would find himself caught. 

Fate, or something like it, had drawn his eyes towards movement. Not right outside of the barricade but along the roads beyond it. He had taken out his binoculars to get a better look, and even in the dim he could make out something that made his stomach clench.

He’d never scrambled down a wall faster in his life.

He had followed at a distance, waiting to catch Jerome in the act of whatever hell he was planning to unleash. He followed, and he followed, and eventually he’d become sick of following. 

Jerome was bizarre, aggravating, and violent. Bruce wouldn’t dare to pretend that he was able to decipher the reasoning behind all of his words and actions but sometimes he thinks that, maybe, he is the person who is closest to actually understanding him. Perhaps almost being the cause of each other’s downfalls had linked them together, somehow. They had seen each other at their best and at their worst. They’d gotten each other’s blood on their hands and it had sunk into them, leaving traces of themselves behind. Bruce will never kill Jerome. Jerome will never kill Bruce. Perhaps they will end up exchanging blows with each other until the end of time, caught up in some kind of cycle. The predictability of it should offend him—he cannot afford to be predictable, he cannot protect his city to the best of his ability when the one who wishes to set everything on fire just to watch the blaze can foretell his actions—but he supposes that at least it is Jerome that he is connected to in such a way. Jerome, whether he fully realized it or not, was a linchpin for Bruce’s ideals. 

He was the reason why Bruce had realized that his most important promise to himself would be that he would not kill.

It doesn’t feel wrong when Jerome kisses him. It feels erratic, unforeseeable. It sends a pleasant shock through him. It makes something dark and grimly amused fill up his chest.

Jeremiah had hurt him more than Jerome ever had, but the marks he’d left on Bruce’s life—terrible as they were—hadn’t changed Bruce in the way he’d wanted. His partnership with Ra’s and the destruction he’d wrought with the generators that Bruce had once dreamed would bring light and hope to Gotham had devastated him. The way he’d hurt the people who Bruce loved tore at his heart. Jeremiah had made him more wary, more paranoid, more angry. But Bruce hadn’t broken under the pressure that he’d exerted. Bruce hadn’t shattered to pieces so that Jeremiah could build him up as the brother that he dreamed of.

Years ago he had almost fractured himself into something unrecognizable; when he’d held a shard of mirror aloft in his hand and had almost given in to the urge to plunge it into Jerome’s chest. By chance he’d caught sight of himself in the mirrors that encircled them, and what he’d seen reflected back at him filled him with despair. He hadn’t let his hatred and rage become his own downfall, but he’d been so close to it. He’d known it. 

Jerome had known it, too. 

Jeremiah wanted to forge an unbreakable connection with him by any means necessary, but Jerome had beaten him to it without even meaning to. Jerome was always an adversary; not a best friend or brother or traitor. Jerome had spurred Bruce on. Would continue to spur Bruce on. He thinks that maybe they’re like two halves of a terrible whole; the likes of which could only be fostered in the shadows of Gotham. 

Villain and hero. Wolf and shepherd. But neither of them were content with playing such limited roles. 

The act of kissing is neither damnation for Bruce, nor is it salvation for Jerome. It is a momentary disintegration of the parts that they were meant to play.

It feels good.

And it would piss Jeremiah right off. 

Bruce allows himself to be pressed back against a wall. Allows himself this time to be selfish.

They can fight tomorrow. Bruce hasn’t forgotten about the stockpile, or the chaos Jerome’s lackies are causing, or the awful things that Jerome has done. He’ll stop him. He’ll find a way to bring him down without compromising the safety of the Green Zone and without killing him. He’ll do what he has to do. He’ll become the hero that all of Gotham needs; both the Green Zone and the Dark Zone. 

But, as time stretches before them, Bruce allows himself to give in to what they both obviously want.

He distantly hopes that Jerome doesn’t say anything to purposefully stoke his temper, this time. Well, any more than what he’d already said. Bruce’s hand had stung when he’d slapped him. The ache dissipated almost immediately, but the constricting feeling in his chest had taken longer for him to get over. 

The hand not tangled up in Jerome’s hair rests tenderly against his cheek, his thumb tracing the raised scar underneath one eye. Even Jerome deserved touches that weren’t aggressive every once in a while, surely. Even Jerome, though he seemed to enjoy violence being enacted upon his person just as much as he enjoyed watching it or doling it out, could get a thrill out of something softer. 

Bruce’s fingers, once wound in Jerome’s hair tightly enough to cause discomfort, begin to loosen.

He doesn’t want to cause pain. Not all the time. Sometimes it is a terrible inevitability that he can’t shake off, but—

He breaks the kiss and rests their foreheads together. He looks into Jerome’s eyes. There is a wall—formed over years and years—that makes him difficult to read, but Bruce had seen it splinter open for a handful of seconds, back in a diner before the beginning of the end. If Bruce looks hard enough he will find fissures and cracks. If Bruce looks hard enough he will see something none of Jerome’s Maniax could even claim to have known existed. 

—he isn’t meant to become the sort of person who hurts without remorse. Above all he wants to protect and to help, even those who want nothing of the sort from him. Refusing assistance to anyone went against his moral code.

“And nobody ever helped me… Ever.” Jerome had told him an age ago, his expression open and raw for a few dizzying moments. Bruce’s heart had ached for him during those seconds of vulnerability, before Jerome’s walls were built back up.

He can feel Jerome’s breath against his mouth, and Jerome’s eyes are looking him over with an intensity that might just match Bruce’s stare. It is both unnerving and exhilarating; because what does Bruce have to hide that Jerome isn’t already perfectly aware of?

What secrets do they possibly have left which one would want to conceal from the other?

He sighs. He wishes he could say something sweet or reassuring without Jerome laughing at him for it. 

He wishes a lot of things.

“You’re getting moody,” Jerome tells him bluntly. He doesn’t pull away. “Having second thoughts?”

“No.” Bruce’s hand traces down Jerome’s cheek, fingers brushing over the ropey scars that extend his eternal smile. He’s had enough violence for today, for weeks, for months. What was the point of occasionally changing their routine if their kisses were always as combative as their fists? He kisses the side of Jerome’s mouth; a soft brush of lips. Maybe, in a diner an age ago, he would have pressed such a kiss—comforting and chaste—into Jerome’s hair if he’d broken down even further. Maybe, in a diner an age ago, the connection between them clicked fully into place without either of them realizing it. “Just thinking that it’s nice to change the steps to the dance every once in a while.”

“Well,” Jerome drawls, seeming bemused by but not entirely put off by Bruce’s tender attentions. He stays very still, as if trying to decide whether or not he wants to bite Bruce’s gentle hand. “I would hate to be predictable.”

“It would certainly make things more boring for you,” Bruce agrees steadily. “And you know how much you hate being bored.”

Jerome snorts. The corners of his eyes crinkle as his grin widens. 

“Manipulative,” he coos. He doesn’t sound particularly bothered by it. “Fine. We can do things your way for once.” He leans in again, pressing his smile against Bruce’s mouth. 

They can fight tomorrow; following the familiar steps of their routine dance.

Tonight, though, they can make up the steps as they go.


End file.
